


Dance With Somebody

by Peggy_Sue



Category: The Baseballs (Band)
Genre: F/M, Other, Rock and Roll
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-05-05
Packaged: 2019-04-27 11:33:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14424543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peggy_Sue/pseuds/Peggy_Sue
Summary: When half of the band's backstage-crew is knocked out by a nasty virus, the guys face the possibility of a cancelled concert.But Basti's cousin Jo might be their knight in shining armour and rescue the day.





	1. Catastrophe

**Author's Note:**

> I have no clue whether anyone but me reads TBB fanfiction any more. Also, I have no clue whether anyone but me writes it any more. There were a few really productive writers a few years ago on LJ, but I don't know where they are now and if they still listen to this music and still love the band. There were also some very decent writers in the German fanfiction world who also seem to have vanished from sight. I saw myself coming back to those stories over and over again. And somehow it ended with me writing my own story now. I have a clue where this is going but I don't want to give too much away hence the really stupid summary. If anybody reads it, I'd be happy to hear from you. Just let me know you're out there and I am not all alone as the last one left in this fandom. <3 (Also I'd be so happy to get to know more people who enjoy this music, I don't really know that many)
> 
> Also: I don't know the band, so all of this is just a silly made-up story. I don't earn money with it and I just write this for entertainment purposes.

“Please tell me you are kidding me, so we can just both laugh about it and everything’s fine.”

Digger pressed the mobile phone closer to his ear while he listened to the voice at the other end: The voice of Saki, usually pleasant and always welcome, was today the voice of eternal doom. 

“I’m sorry, but I’m serious. Half of the team and I are out for today. Sorry, mate. Just hope you guys didn’t catch that stomach flu as well. It’s nasty.”

“But Saki, we have a show tonight!”

“I know it’s a bit inconvenient…”

“It’s not a bit inconvenient, Saki. Having a sore throat when you need to sing a high note is a bit inconvenient. Having packed not enough shirts and playing two night in a row in the same chequered piece of sweat is inconvenient. Arriving half an hour late because somebody threw themselves in front of the bloody subway is inconvenient. Having a show tonight and not being able to soundcheck because there’s no sound-man, not being able to light-check because the lighting guys can’t decide who is in charge when their boss is not here and being two people short in the back for getting the equipment on and off stage is not inconvenient. It’s a catastrophe! How are we supposed to make this happen? This is impossible!”

He walked up and down in front of the drumset that had already been carried on stage by the few roadies that had been left unscathed by the last bout of norovirus. His hands flew up while he spoke, waving through the air, pulling at his hair - luckily he had not done the quiff yet, otherwise he’d have destroyed it in a second.

“You’ll have to figure something out. I know you’ll do it, boy. You always come up with the ideas in this band…. ugh… sorry. Got to hang up.”

And that was it. Saki had hung up and The Baseballs had a concert to play with no technical crew and hardly any helpers. Well, great. Digger sighed. He might be the creative head of the band, the guy whose brain constantly came up with ideas, whether they were brilliant or stupid or stupidly brilliant. But they usually had to do with music, or with how to make the show better. Saki was the manager, the one who made all the background-stuff run smoothly. Up to this day, the system they had - Digger being the creative guy and Saki being the one to pull the strings so the creativity wasn’t inhibited by a missing instrument or a missing piece of equipment - had worked smoothly. It had never failed. And now they were screwed.

Damn.

 

Sam appeared, carrying two guitar-cases in his hand and a third one on his back. 

“Wow. You don’t look happy” he stated the obvious and set the two cases down. “Has anything happened?”

Digger sighed and simply sat down cross-legged on the floor right where he had been standing.

“We can’t play the show” he said in a flat voice that didn’t even sound like himself any more.

Sam frowned, shrugged he third guitar off his back and sat down on the drumset-platform next to his friend and colleague.

“What do you mean: We can’t play the show? Are you ill? Should I take you to a doctor?”   


Digger shook his head and closed his eyes for a second.

“Saki just called. Him and like at least half of the crew has caught the norovirus.”

“Fuck!” Sam murmured.

“Yap, exactly. You’ve got it.”

“But… this show is sold out. People have been waiting for this. We can’t just cancel last minute. That’s shitty and nasty. Especially as the band and us are all okay.”   


Digger shook his head.

"I have absolutely no idea how to handle this. I can’t magic up extra stage-hands. I can’t magic up someone for the sound and I can’t magic up someone for the light either.”   


“Is there anything I can do?” Sam asked.

Digger frowned, then grinned.

“You could go backstage and hammer the heads of our spotlight-guys against each other until they see reason and cooperate.”

“Okay” Sam said and stood up, miming as if he truly wanted to follow that order.

Digger couldn’t help but laugh. It had been a couple of years since he had first met Sven at a party. They had clicked immediately, because they shared the passion for Rock’n’Roll, a bad taste in movies and a matching if not similar sense of humour. Basti had joined their team soon after and they had started jamming together. When Digger had first introduced the idea of forming a band, it had been just one of these ideas you have at three o’clock in the morning. But it had developed into something more substantial and grown into a pretty big thing. A thing that paid their bills and had them playing gigs all over Europe. It was like a crazy dream that had become reality. And it had all started in Berlin, right here.

“Damn”, Digger stated, “We have to play that show tonight.”

 

Right at that moment, Basti arrived. He didn’t look too cheery, so he had probably also heard the news already. He nodded when Digger asked him, explaining that one of the roadies had just been on the phone to one of her mates and he had heard the retching through the speakers.

“Oh, brilliant. Spare us the details next time”, Sam commented. “So. Do you have any idea what we can do so we don’t have to cancel the gig? I mean, we’re in Berlin. You’re from here. You must know people who know people.”

Basti shrugged.

“Well. I could call Jo”, he suggested. “My cousin’s pretty decent at this kind of thing. She works for one of the tiny private theatres in the city.”

Digger hesitated, then nodded.

“Is Jo all right? Do you get along?”

It was all too clear what he was implying: Will cousin Jo fit in with the crew and be easy to work with? Because in the current situation we don’t need extra complications.

Basti grinned.

“Jo’s absolutely brilliant”, he said. 

Sam and Digger both smiled.

“Then ride forth, Sir Basti and save the day with the power of long-distance-communication that is given to thee by the mighty O2 company!” Digger commanded. 

He already felt much better about the show. Recommendations by Basti were rare and had never been failures. If he considered Jo “absolutely brilliant”, that Jo had to be close to a demigod.


	2. Jo

Three quarters of an hour later, Digger almost emptied a full cup of steaming hot coffee onto his shirt. That would have fit in with the rest of this day just splendidly. Why did this total eejit have to run into him? At this time of day the area around the Warschauer Straße was still pretty quiet and not as crowded as it would be later on. There was really no need to…

He hesitated and his hand instinctively to check the pocket of his jeans where he usually kept his purse. The next moment, he had dropped his coffee cup and was running after the asshole who had stolen his money. The guy was already close to the staircase that led down to the S-Bahn. Digger cursed under his breath and prayed the train would not arrive in the next minute. his prayers went unnoticed. Right when the thief had reached the bottom of the stairs and Digger was about to run down the steps, a number 75 stopped at the platform and opened its doors.

Digger screamed and - taking two steps at a time - tried to reach the culprit. There was a wet spot on one of his worn-out converse were slippery. He half stumbled, half fell and ended on the platform on his knees and hands. The doors of the S-Bahn were already closed and the opening button wasn’t green any more. The thief, a guy about 10 years younger than him, stood at the door, waved and flipped him off.

Digger swore again. He got up, telling a middle-aged woman who had come to help him up, that he was fine and no he really wasn’t drunk. Then he looked at the damage. His jeans were torn at the knees and both knees were bleeding. His hands looked better, but his wrists felt weird and his left ankle protested when he wanted to put weight on it. 

Great. Half of the crew on sick leave, no coffee, no purse, but half a dozen injuries. Way to live your life, bro! 

He considered walking back up the stairs and came to the conclusion he’d not be able to manage with the twisted ankle. He wrinkled his nose. The lift in this station usually smelled worse than a dixie toilet. As he hobbled over, he noticed that it was out of order anyways. So back to the stairs. 

Would it be humiliating to call Sam and ask him to help him back to the venue? He was already scrolling through his phone book when a girl, who had just left the S7 from the city center, stopped next to him offering him her arm.

“You look like you need a helping hand.”

Digger frowned, suspicious. This was Berlin. People being helpful usually happened elsewhere. He gave her a quick once over. She was about 25 years old, perhaps a little older. Dark short hair stood in spikes from her head and she wore a lot of eyeliner but no other makeup. Baggy khaki trousers looked huge on her slender frame. A black t-shirt, a leather jacket and blue chucks finished off the look. She noticed his gaze and his frown and smiled, holding out her hand.

“Oh, sorry ‘bout that, You can’t know me yet. We never met even though I was at a couple of your concerts. I am Basti’s cousin. he told me you were short of some technical staff and my expertise might come in handy.”

Digger stared - his brain only slowly processing and adapting to the new information. 

“You are Jo?” he asked sheepishly.

The girl smiled even wider.

“Johanna. But my family and friends call me Jo. You can call me Jo as well.”

 

So Jo was a girl. Interesting.

 

Digger took her hand and then accepted her arm, leaning on her heavily as he hopped up the stairs.

“What exactly happened here?” she asked, indicating his torn jeans and sprained ankle. 

Digger sighed and explained how he had only wanted to grab a coffee and had ended up with none and no money to buy a new one on top of that.

“Just lucky I don’t keep any of my bank cards in that wallet so I don’t have to get them deactivated and shit. but the purse is gone.”

Jo nodded.

“And you’re injured.”

“Nah, it’s gonne be fine. Just got to put some ice on it. As long as I can shake my hips, I’ll survive the night.”

She laughed - an open, honest aligh.

“Okay. So you are still in dire need of a caffeine fix= You’re invited. That is, I expect to be paid a shitload of money for saving your ass tonight and the two bucks fifty for a coffee are not worth talking about with that in mind.”

Digger grinned.

“Black, little bit of milk, plain old coffee”, he said. “You?”

She shrugged.

“Guess!”

He laughed. He liked this girl. She was easy to be around. And she had no affectations about her. he liked that as well. 

“Cappuccino.” he said. “Possibly with some kind of syrup in it when you can get it.”

She nodded approvingly.

“Good man” she stated. “But it’s not when I can get it, but just when the day was really shitty. Up to now this day is not a syrup day for me.”

They grabbed their coffee at one of the stalls on the bridge and went back to the club.

 

“Ah there you are! We were about to call the police and tell them we lost you”, Sam greeted Differ as he saw his friend enter the building again. Then he hesitated.

“Goodness. What happened? Are you injured?”

He looked genuinely concerned, but Digger just waved him off.

“He got mugged” Jo explained quickly. “ANd landed a little badly, when he rushed after the thief and fell down the stairs.”

She held out her hand.

“Hi, I am Jo.”

Digger nodded, as Sam seemed to be insecure whether or not to shake the hand that was offered to him.

“She might actually save the day and make tonight’s show possible. She also bought me coffee.”

“We’ll see what I can do”, Jo shrugged. “I never worked with a band before.”

Sam smiled. He liked when people were humble. He also approved of this young woman not only helping his injured friend back to the venue but also buying him his favourite coffee. Digger without his caffeine fix was no fun to be around and she had unknowingly saved them all from the wrath of the decaffeinated Rock’n’Roller.


End file.
